The Lives of my Comrades
by OhayoHimawari
Summary: Kakashi values the lives of his comrades, he already knows this. But Asuma's death and Kurenai's pregnancy urge him to reevaluate what this declaration means to him, as he deals with his own grief of losing another of his fellow Leaf shinobi. A/N: This story falls within episodes 81 and 82 of Naruto Shippuden. I do not own these characters, I had a wonderful time exploring them.


**A/N:** **This story falls within episodes 81 and 82 of Naruto Shippuden, and it is my submission to Kakashiweek 2018, "grief" prompt.**

 **I do not own these characters; I had a wonderful time exploring them.**

"Kakashi, we need to call off the training and return immediately."

 _'Someone isn't coming back this time.'_

"What's happened?" Kakashi doesn't need to ask, doesn't want to ask, but he does anyway.

The expression on Tenzo's face as he approached them was one Kakashi knew well. He knew what words were coming. It was only a matter of which name would be attached to them.

"Asuma Sarutobi has been killed." Tenzo supplies the name to go with those words.

 _'Asuma isn't coming back this time.'_

It didn't immediately occur to Kakashi to condole with Kurenai. He keeps himself to himself and gives others plenty of space to deal with their pain privately, too. He got the idea from his hyperactive student Naruto who, once he recovered from the shock of the news, thought straight away to seek out Konohamaru.

He decides to go to the liquor store, first. Kakashi tries to remember what it is that Kurenai drinks along the way. Then he remembers he can't forget what he never knew to begin with. _'Does it really matter for this occasion, though?'_ He grabs a standard bottle-of-whatever to bring with him. It would suit for an evening of recalling the past and mourning the loss in the present.

He wasn't prepared to worry about the future.

"What am I going to **do** , Kakashi? How am I going to do this without him?"

Kakashi couldn't answer Kurenai while he was still stuck one step behind her. _'Pregnant?'_ He knew she and Asuma were tight- had been since they were all kids- and he had his suspicions that their relationship went beyond friendship. But to learn they were making a family together? It seems his blind spot was bigger than he thought. Was this what Asuma wanted to tell him at the hospital that day? Kakashi bookmarks the memory of it for later.

"You're not alone Kurenai. I'll help. We'll all help. You'll be ok." He didn't know what that promise would entail, but he did know that it would be kept, no matter what. He set to calming Kurenai down. He stayed with her until she cried herself to exhaustion, and tucked her in. Then he grabbed the bottle-of-whatever that wound up suiting nothing, and let himself out.

Arriving at his apartment, Kakashi sets the bottle down on the desk across from his bed. He sheds a couple of layers of shinobi gear but doesn't feel any lighter. Analyzing his most recent and final conversation with Asuma, he wonders why the man hadn't told him that Kurenai was expecting. They'd been comrades since the days of their brief childhood. Had Asuma thought him that unapproachable with his secret? Hadn't that been what his relationship with Kurenai was? A secret?

 _'Not really,'_ Kakashi traces his finger over one of the shuriken patterned on his bedspread. The lovers were probably obvious to anyone that cared about them, and he was having trouble owning his unawareness of it. _'I value the lives of my comrades,'_ he reassures himself. Asuma's death and Kurenai's pregnancy urge him to reevaluate what this declaration means to him.

 _'I would do whatever it takes to protect them.'_ He already knows this, that's not what's bothering him. What makes up the lives he's so adamant about defending? How well does he know the people he's so willing to die for?

Kakashi sighs out some of the weight on his chest. He glances at the bottle he'd taken to Kurenai's but wound up bringing home with him instead. He's in no mood to drink alone but has no idea who else to pour for. There are precious few members of his generation of shinobi left in Konoha. Glancing out the window at the moon, he determines it's too late to rally any of them anyway and chooses to turn in. He would have to wait to share that bottle-of-whatever with one of them.

Morning comes as is expected and the jounin can't avoid it. The hours between getting the news of Asuma's death and attending his funeral had run out. Becoming a part of the past along with everything else Kakashi can't change.

Brushing his teeth while he waits for the shower to warm up, he checks the status of his stubble. _'The mask will cover it.'_ He rinses and spits and sees to cleaning the rest of himself. Then he shaves out of respect for his fallen comrade, anyway. Tea and toast later, he's out the door, donning the black attire he'd worn so often.

Kakashi takes his place among the jonin of Konoha to pay his final respects. He's ready to stand by Kurenai if needed, but the kunoichi proves her strength as she hovers over the newest grave. Her goodbyes said, the offering line begins. Kakashi notices that only two of Asuma's three students are there; he notes that he has the loss of a sensei in common with them now.

 _'Asuma isn't coming back this time.'_

This fact is steadily becoming harder to ignore as he nears the grave to place his own offering upon it. He completes the gesture and returns to his place without revealing the emotions simmering within him.

He can't say the same for Gai. The man is unabashedly weeping, rivers streaming from his eyes.

Since the fallen comrade was a Sarutobi, the procession of shinobi bearing offerings will continue for a long, long time. Before he could be crushed under the weight of the grieving and what little he can do for them, Kakashi shifts his thoughts to wondering how little he knows about them, too. He thinks of the bottle-of-whatever waiting to be shared and how it could be just the thing to learn more about the lives of his comrades.

Starting with the wailing man beside him. As the jounin of Konoha continue to present their tokens, Kakashi mulls over questions about the life of his eternal rival he might want answers to.

 _'Gai's love life? No. No, no. No. But I wonder what he visualizes when he opens the inner gates.'_

Midway through the chunin depositing their flowers, he's exhausted the significant bits he's curious about. He delves into ridiculous details that he neither needs to know nor should.

 _'I wonder what Gai's favorite color is…green? Too obvious. He calls himself the "Blue Beast" so, maybe?'_

By the time the genin take their turn, Kakashi's brain is deep into the familiar terrain of self-loathing.

 _' **Why** didn't I approach Gai when his father died? I'm such a self-involved arrogant ass!'_

The funeral ends, and Kakashi's heart is racing. He's sweating and unsteady on his feet. He banishes himself to his apartment to deal with his grief and the feelings of worthlessness and helplessness and shame.

Once the door closes behind him, he yanks down the mask to gulp at air. Kakashi reminds himself that he knows what's happening, and he knows what to do. He sits on the floor with his back against his bed and focuses on breathing, pushing his breath through his muscles, relaxing them. It's a trick Shikaku taught him after the embarrassing episode with the chidori that had caused him to faint all those years ago.

Kakashi was lucky Lord Fourth thought to send Gai to back him up that time. He'd needed his eternal rival to bail him out.

His fragile calm threatened again he opens his eye and looks about the room for something to focus on. The fading sunlight shines on the bottle-of-whatever still on his desk. He reaches for it and opens it.

It smells like the cure-all that Orochimaru tried to peddle to the citizens of Konoha for common ailments that turned out to be, quite literally, snake oil. Kakashi takes a swig anyway. It tastes like a hospital and black licorice.

 _'At least I didn't offer it to anyone else,'_ he pours the bottle-of-whatever down the kitchen sink. _'I would've made enemies instead of friends.'_ But, it did distract him from his anxious, self-loathing thoughts. He's ready now to break the news to the person he does consider a friend.

He heads to meet with him. Kakashi knows precisely where his friend is; he doesn't have to wonder. This friend is always there for him, the best listener Kakashi has ever known. He'll never change, and Kakashi can never do anything to hurt him.

Because this friend is already dead.

He stands before the memorial stone and tells Obito the latest news of the village.

"Asuma isn't coming back this time."

Kakashi has said it aloud, shared it with his friend, so it's real. He takes a deep breath.

"Kurenai is pregnant with their child," he looks at the stone, seeing parents and children, friends and lovers now instead of only names. "I didn't know. Asuma didn't tell me when he was alive," Kakashi tries to explain why he's still there, and Asuma isn't.

"I don't know why he didn't tell me, and I wish he had. I would've been happy for him, congratulated him. There's so little I know about the lives of my comrades, Obito." Kakashi empties all the troubling thoughts weighing in his mind and on his chest.

"I value them, I would protect them with my life, regardless if they call me their 'friend,' or if I can say the same of them." He looks down at his feet and confides, "I thought that didn't matter, but I guess it does, to me. Asuma's death shows me that I ought to be just as willing to live for them, with them, as I am to die for them. I would be more useful that way to Kurenai, at least." Kakashi sighs, and looks up to the stone again.

"So, keep an eye out for Asuma, would you Obito? He's on his way to you," Kakashi tucks his hands into his pockets. "And when you see him, tell him that I- that all of us will help take care of Kurenai and his child. His family will be ok."

 **The End**


End file.
